Another bubble has burst...The bubble in higher education has popped.

College Search & Selection
1

<p>All the old data....costs per student.... class sizes...what is taught...who teaches the classes.... who goes to the schools is not accurate or relevant.</p>

<p>Because the bubble has burst and big changes are occuring and will occur in the future.</p>

<p>We all see what is going on in the UCs this week. Harvard is cutting back. UNC is looking to change its model. Dartmouth is cutting back. </p>

<p>William and Mary is a good case in point.</p>

<p>The</a> Virginia Gazette - News - Profs say cuts affecting classroom</p>

<p>"Even before Friday’s announcement that cuts in state funding will force 12 layoffs among 31 jobs to be eliminated at the College of William & Mary, two professors told the Board of Visitors this week that the effect of dwindling budgets is already being felt in the classroom.</p>

<p>“We really are pushed right now to the limits because of these cuts,” Biology Department chair Lizabeth Allison told the board on Thursday.</p>

<p>Allison noted that the cancellation of tenure-eligible faculty searches has forced the college to bring in adjunct professors, or hire professors on one-year contracts to fill in. That, she explained, results in a loss of mentoring, loss of faculty committee work and an overarching concern about the quality of specific majors or academic programs.</p>

<p>History Department chairman Phil Daileader agreed.</p>

<p>“William and Mary is simply not the school it was two years ago.”</p>

2

<p>With everything else having busted, how could colleges have avoided this?</p>

<p>It seems that how they handle the cutbacks is the key. My DS at Dartmouth participated in a student vote on what should be cut. When I saw the list of possibilities (office for transgender women’s studies majors–OK slight exaggeration, but very slight) I can see why the majority of Dartmouth students are OK with most of what they cut.</p>

<p>Harvard on the other hand cut hot breakfasts. Those kids nearly rioted. They could substantially cut services and still end up with better resources than 99.9% of schools ever had.</p>

<p>But in all seriousness, it’s the schools where library hours are being cut, profs fired, large numbers of classes canceled, maintenance being deferred and where it will now be hard to graduate in 4 years that folks should have a very close look at.</p>

3

<p>Hmom5, you know a lot more about Dartmouth than I do…</p>

<p>Is a $50 million a year cut for 2 years …significant?</p>

<p>[Dartmouth</a> Trustees Set Budget-Cutting Targets - Education News Story - WMUR Manchester](<a href=“http://www.wmur.com/education/21555149/detail.html]Dartmouth”>Manchester, New Hampshire News and Weather - WMUR Channel 9)</p>

<p>[Dartmouth’s</a> Strategic Budget Reduction & Investment](<a href=“http://budget.dartmouth.edu/]Dartmouth’s”>http://budget.dartmouth.edu/)</p>

<p>I don’t mean to pick on Dartmouth…I was using Dartmouth as an example. I don’t think there are very many schools that are going to come out unscathed.</p>

4

<p>Harvard cut a lot more than hot breakfasts. They have already laid off hundreds of staff, and they announced a reduction in faculty just this week. They stopped their massive Allston campus expansion project in its tracks. And more cuts are on the way. It’s not pretty out there.</p>

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<p>Yeah…I agree coureur. I don’t think there are many schools that are going to cut hot breakfasts or an obscure major, be done with the cutbacks, and the financial problems go away.</p>

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<p>I have a kid at Dartmouth too. And I’d say 50 million in cuts per year is pretty big. I don’t think it’s going to be The End of Dartmouth as We Know It, but there will be some hard choices made.</p>

7

<p>I agree that $50MM would hurt anywhere. Though Dartmouth appears to have found ways to involve the students in what gets cut and to avoid the deep anger going on at Harvard. I’ve only heard this from 6 or 8 students, so it’s only anecdotal.</p>

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<p>On the other hand, a cut of $50 million hurts more if your budget is $450 million (as Dartmouth’s undergrad budget is) than if your total budget is measured in the billions. My understanding is that the total cut at Dartmouth, including the Medical School, is more like $72 billion on a total budget of $700 million. The Medical School is going to take an additional $25 million hit on an operating budget of $235 million.</p>

<p>[Dartmouth</a> Medical School announces budget-reconciliation plan](<a href=“http://budget.dartmouth.edu/communications/27may2009-dms.html]Dartmouth”>http://budget.dartmouth.edu/communications/27may2009-dms.html)</p>

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<p>Schools that never had a mega-endowment to grow fat and spoiled on are not hurting as much as Harvard. Harvard’s Allston expansion has ground to a halt. By comparison, Penn just broke ground on its own Postal Lands expansion.</p>

<p>Yale’s expansions are also on track, although it had to issue $1 billion in bonds to do so.</p>

10

<p>[U-M&lt;/a&gt; plans largest ever investment in financial aid](<a href=“U-M plans largest ever investment in financial aid | University of Michigan News”>U-M plans largest ever investment in financial aid | University of Michigan News)</p>

<p>"Faced with the toughest economic times since the Great Depression, the University of Michigan Board of Regents today voted 6 to 2 to approve a general fund budget that calls for $118 million in centrally awarded financial aid, including an 11.7 percent increase in financial aid for undergraduates.</p>

<p>It is the largest investment in central need-based financial aid in U-M history.</p>

<p>The $1.46 billion FY 2010 general fund budget proposed by President Mary Sue Coleman and Provost Teresa Sullivan is part of a forward-looking budget planning process to ensure U-M remains financially and academically strong and continues to provide students access to a high-quality education despite economic uncertainty in the state and nation.</p>

<p>The budget assumes the U-M in FY 2010 will receive $316.6 million in state support, the amount it received in 2006 and $10 million less than it received this year. The state agreed to maintain support for higher education at 2006 levels as a condition for receiving federal stimulus money. Based on state revenue forecasts, U-M budget planners must prepare for uncertain state support for higher education by FY 2011.</p>

<p>“These challenging economic times call for a historic response from the University of Michigan. We know this is a difficult period for our students and their families and, for some, the economic recession is affecting their ability to cover educational costs,” Coleman said.</p>

<p>“The economic downturn has only reinforced our commitment to ensuring a U-M education is accessible to students,” Coleman said.</p>

<p>The budget continues the university’s ongoing commitment to meet the full demonstrated financial need of all undergraduates who are state residents, and to continue to boost financial aid at a greater rate than tuition. It includes a 5.6 percent tuition increase for resident and nonresident undergraduate and most graduate programs.</p>

<p>Tuition and fees for first-year undergraduates in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts in 2009-2010 will be:</p>

<p>–$11,659 (a $622 increase from the previous year) for Michigan residents, and</p>

<p>–$34,937 (a $1,868 increase) for nonresidents.</p>

<p>Sullivan said that with the encouragement of the regents, the university has considered a longer horizon in preparing this budget to project revenues and expenditures, which will give U-M time to make adjustments and help it avoid the severe upheaval and double-digit tuition increases that some universities have experienced.</p>

<p>“We continue to pursue a very disciplined approach to our budgeting,” Sullivan said. “We have been cutting expenses for the past seven years and continue to look for ways to enhance revenue and contain costs.”</p>

<p>The university’s fiscal planning process calls for $36.5 million in budget cuts over the next three years. Units were asked to pare their budgets for FY 2010, resulting in $15.2 million in savings through elimination of some positions, not replacing equipment and other operational efficiencies."</p>

11

<p>I find this disturbing.</p>

<p>[Editorial:</a> State must stop destruction of higher education - San Jose Mercury News](<a href=“Editorial: State must stop destruction of higher education – The Mercury News”>Editorial: State must stop destruction of higher education – The Mercury News)</p>

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<p>Florida publics have had their budgets slashed as well…</p>

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<p>""Faced with the toughest economic times since the Great Depression, the University of Michigan Board of Regents today voted 6 to 2 to approve a general fund budget that calls for $118 million in centrally awarded financial aid, including an 11.7 percent increase in financial aid for undergraduates.</p>

<p>It is the largest investment in central need-based financial aid in U-M history."</p>

<p>This is an excellent example of academicians being out of touch with reality. The economical state of affairs in Michigan is near depression levels, yet rather than cut budgets and find ways to spend more efficiently, the University approves a huge budget increase. the tax payers should demand that the University of Michigan refund all wasted money and shrink it’s budget. For chrissake, people are losing houses, cars and livelihoods and the University wants to bilk them at an accelerated level? </p>

<p>Shame on UM!</p>

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<p>"This is an excellent example of academicians being out of touch with reality. The economical state of affairs in Michigan is near depression levels, yet rather than cut budgets and find ways to spend more efficiently, the University approves a huge budget increase. the tax payers should demand that the University of Michigan refund all wasted money and shrink it’s budget. For chrissake, people are losing houses, cars and livelihoods and the University wants to bilk them at an accelerated level? </p>

<p>Shame on UM! "</p>

<p>This is what a university with a huge endowment can do in bad times. Michigan is benefiting from the lack of planning of most other schools. It is getting stronger when others are holding on for dear life. A great public school in the state of Michigan is one of the best ways to foster a recovery.</p>

15

<p>Tuition control, research, and endowment are the big three areas where schools can maintain quality without much state help. If you have all three as a few schools do you can do fine.</p>

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<p>Rjk,
Do you even know the facts about your school?</p>

<p>Annual Budget: Over $5 billion</p>

<p>Income from Endowment: About $170 million</p>

<p>In other words, income from endowment covers less than 3.5% of the budget. U Michigan has a nice endowment, but spread it out over the size of a behemoth U Michigan (both students and ongoing facilities) and its financial impact is rather limited.</p>

<p>As for the overall budgeting process, at many of the top publics, the day of reckoning has come. Something’s gotta give. Some schools have some room to work with their tuition income, but U Michigan is not one of them. Consider the following comparison:</p>

<p>IS Tuition & Fees , State University</p>

<p>$5,396 , U N CAROLINA
$7,506 , GEORGIA TECH
$8,020 , U WISCONSIN
$8,228 , UCLA
$8,352 , UC BERKELEY
$8,798 , UC SAN DIEGO
$9,870 , U VIRGINIA
$10,800 , WILLIAM & MARY
$11,614 , U ILLINOIS
$11,738 , U MICHIGAN</p>

<p>OOS Tuition & Fees , State University</p>

<p>$22,270 , U WISCONSIN
$22,294 , U N CAROLINA
$25,716 , GEORGIA TECH
$25,756 , U ILLINOIS
$29,897 , UCLA
$30,022 , UC BERKELEY
$30,592 , WILLIAM & MARY
$30,819 , UC SAN DIEGO
$31,870 , U VIRGINIA
$34,230 , U MICHIGAN</p>

<p>This data is from the year 2008-09. Since then all of these costs have gone higher, but the relative differences have not changed much. As you can see, for entering freshmen, U Michigan is already the priciest option among top publics. And, as you know and unlike any of the others, the price for U Michigan goes up for juniors and seniors. </p>

<p>The publics are facing some tough choices and none are exempt. But some (like U Wisconsin and U North Carolina) have some running room to increase tuition rates.</p>

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<p>When you take the UM Hospital operations which are really just a large side business out of the equation the base UM budget for education excluding research net expenditures is around $1.6 Billion. Now endowment counts for much more of the margin of excellence. I do like the fact that UW still has some serious room to increase tuition when the going gets tougher. It’s like a large credit card with all of the credit line still open.</p>

18

<p>I like your credit line analogy…assuming the student demand is still there. The U Wisconsin OOS numbers look good on the surface, but are heavily influenced by the sweetheart deal given to Minnesota residents. </p>

<p>I think that U Wisconsin has the capacity to increase OOS enrollment from outside of Minnesota as IMO the school is a great value. Its product is nearly identical to what is on offer at U Michigan and U Michigan costs more than 50% more. U Wisconsin’s story needs to be more broadly told as it’s a very appealing place.</p>

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<p>Everything I have seen tells me they are working very hard at that right now.</p>

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<p>" U Wisconsin’s story needs to be more broadly told as it’s a very appealing place."</p>

<p>Agreed. It is one of the world’s great universities - largely on par with other great publics like Michigan, Berkeley and UCLA - and Madison is a wonderful city in which to live and study. Prospective students should give it a very close look. Most people I know who have attended UW-Madison have had very positive experiences there.</p>